


Goddamn Right, You Should Be Scared Of Me

by orphan_account



Series: October Fic-A-Thon [3]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Dragons, Elves, M/M, Magical Tattoos, Prophetic Dreams, Soul Bond, Witches
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-03
Updated: 2016-10-08
Packaged: 2018-08-19 07:18:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8195641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Keith is a Witch, according to the Magical Gifts Act of 2020. He lives in the Gifted District of Altea with all the other so-called Gifted beings and mostly keeps to himself. He churns out the occasional healing salve and sleeping draught to be collected by the city's magical enforcement unit, works at Allura's tattoo shop, and stays as far away from trouble as he can. So what if he has dreams that seem to be begging him to help people? If he starts acting on them he'll have to register that power and then...well who knows what. Nothing he wants, that much he knows. Things were going so well until Lance's friend Hunk stopped by.





	1. What Keith Saw

**Author's Note:**

> This will be days 3-5 of the Fic-A-Thon. 
> 
> Title is a line from Control, by Hasley (I'm lame, I accept this, but also choose to believe it's the sort of shit Keith listens to.)

Keith was a lot of things, some good and some...not as good. Orphan, having been abandoned at a fire station of all things shortly after he was born. Problem child, according to the foster parents he'd bounced between. Unlovable and unteachable according to many. Apprentice and friend to others. 

Tattoo artist, a pretty good one in his opinion, and of course, a registered and legal witch in the city of Altea. Not so much in the broom riding and big hat wearing sense, though he did have a cat and had been eyeing a pointy wide brimmed hat lately. (If Lance and Pidge both had one, and insisted they was actually great for keeping potions and magical blowback away from the eyes, who was he to hold out?) as the legal sense of the word. 

As defined by the Magical Gifts Act, a Witch was any person who was at least one-quarter human and able to harness magical energy. When supernatural creatures had come out into the open, wanting to be full members of society, laws had followed to regulate the sudden influx of beings with *power* and it was all way before Keith's time, but he lived with and under those laws. Many things about his life were determined by the Magical Gifts Act.

Having to check in with a handler once a year, having his magic observed and catalogued, keeping a log of any potions he might brew, having a special mark in his ID that marked him as half-human and a channeler.  It meant living in the Gifted District,or Magical Slums as so many called them, an urban sprawl that the city barely maintained, crammed full of too many people in too small a space. Keith’s place was decent compared to most, because he provided healing creams and sleep draughts to the government and that got him special status, but it was small and cramped, little more than one large room with barely enough space for an altar, a bookshelf, and all of his brewing tools. If he didn’t sleep on a futon he could fold up and stash in a corner when he needed to work he wasn’t sure how he’d manage.

They all lived there, in that tiny slice of Altea, but had come there different. Lance had grown up there, on the outskirts where people who were useful to the government and had families lives. Lance claimed his grandmother was a Voodoo Priestess who'd moved from New Orleans some years ago, thinking Altea held better opportunity, and his mother a necromancer (the two things were not related, he had stressed when Keith asked, and to assume so meant Keith was an asshole) who apparently worked with the police, hence their fairly nice home and living conditions. Shiro had been captured and tagged, part of a rogue unregistered egg clutch, then released into the city's tender care. He was an enforcer of sorts, went into fires before the firefighters, bad situations before the cops, and handled the heavy rogue beings and occasional demon attack before the special forces went in, which was about the only kind of work his kind could get. Allura and Coran were ambassadors, who didn't live so much in the city as in a pocket dimension alongside it, who trained worthy magic users to work for the government in exchange for other elves being able to come and go in Altea as they pleased. 

And Keith. Keith was no one. He'd bounced around the human system until his magic developed, been kicked into the even less kind Gifted Beings system, and eventually he'd caught Allura's eye and ended up with her. He'd been lucky because most of the kids he'd grown up with were more likely to end up facing down Shiro during a fairy dust raid than having coffee with him. 

If he was something other than ‘One of the best Channelers of his generation’ his life would be a lot less...comfortable than it was.

There were many types of witches and no two were ever exactly alike in power and speciality but they were all categorized, for legal purposes, under four headings. Summoners, who used their magic to call things to them. Conjurers, who used their magic to form things. Projecters, who could use their magic to directly affect the world around them. Channelers, who pushed their magic through objects or used it to imbue objects with certain traits. The latter was commonly regarded as the weaker of the schools, which was very much Keith’s luck, but he'd found a way to make it work that worked for him and made him useful. 

And so being 'Useful' made his skin crawl a little bit. Better that than something...else. 

But, all of that aside, he was cold and tired. He'd woken up later than he'd wanted to find Red, his supposed familiar but really was just a cat that had perched outside of his bedroom window one day and refused to fuck off, perched on his chest, yowling. He'd tried to shush her, she wasn't registered and if anyone knew he had her he'd be in trouble but he'd just gotten his chest clawed for his trouble. By the time he'd fed her and rubbed healing salve on himself he'd had to leave without coffee or food. 

His own fault. He'd been up late working on new ink formulations. They'd gotten some Naga venom in and he had some ideas for it but he probably shouldn't have stayed up til 3am working in them. He swore to himself as he hurried down the icy street, dodging other creatures and shouting an apology back at a disgruntled kitsune he's almost run over, that next time he wouldn't stay up so late. 

Except he absolutely would. He always did. 

Keith yawned as he pushed open the front door of the shop, grunting a greeting to Pidge who was fiddling with the computer behind the front desk. She was tapping away at something on her tablet, chewing on the end of her long thick braid absently, and didn’t even look up when she waved a distracted greeting. He reached for her as he walked past, tugging her braid so it popped free of her teeth, then ducking away when she swiped at him, laughing quietly. 

“Is that coffee?” He asked, zeroing in on the steaming mug by her elbow. Pidge’s eyes darted over to the mug then back up to him. They were still and silent for a moment, staring each other down and waiting for the other to move first. She blinked and Keith moved, hand darting out for the cup. Pidge flicked a hand and sparks, bright green and hissing, arced from her fingertips to the cup, circling the entire thing in a shimmering green dome.

Keith stopped short, sighing. He could never decide if he envious of the way she could casually manipulate her energy as a conjurer, while Keith relied on talismans, circles, and his sword to channel, or annoyed that she’d apparently gotten vastly different lessons on how to use magic than he’d gotten (“Magic is not for casual use Keith. Use your magic, do not abuse it.”)  Mostly, at the moment, he wanted some fucking coffee. 

“Katie-”

“There’s coffee in the back.” She said, turning back to her tablet. “But Shiro and Lance are back there being gross. Again.” 

“Fantastic.” Keith grumbled, rolling his eyes. 

She made a sympathetic noise in response but, he noted as he started slogging towards the employee lounge, didn’t banish the barrier. He was very tempted to just set up for the day and forgo what was probably disgusting coffee anyway, Shiro was a great many things but capable of making decent coffee wasn’t one of them. The extra super strength sludge he made might have been fine for a dragon, what with their indestructible stomachs, but the rest of them weren’t built so tough. 

But, as much as he didn’t want to be subject to his best friend and Lance being sickening in semi-public, he was going to need coffee today. The new artist Allura had hired, some old friend of Lance’s, was due to come in and introduce himself soon and if he was going to survive the encounter he needed to be caffeinated. He was envisioning another Lance and the thought made him shudder: loud, brash, competitive for the sake of being competitive...but, if Keith was being honest, one of the best people he knew. 

Even if Lance was now more or less dating his best friend, or well on his way to it, and monopolizing way too much of Shiro’s time considering they weren’t actually having sex. Keith couldn’t begin to imagine what they did together for so many hours day after day. If he was going to assume based on what he witnessed they pretended not to look at each other, blushed and stammered like teenagers, and then mumbled apologies before repeating the process again. 

It was disgusting. They made his stomach hurt with all the magic energy they put off whenever they were close to each other and his teeth ache with their excessive sweetness. 

When he turned into the lounge and was greeted with the sight of them sitting across the small table from each other, Lance working on finishing up something on transfer paper and Shiro pretending to stare intently at his laptop, he shuddered. They were at it again, he could tell, and it was proven true when, no more than 30 seconds after he walked in, Shiro glanced up to look at Lance then hurriedly looked down, clacking away at his computer more aggressively. A moment later Lance paused in what he was going to peer across the table at Shiro. 

Worse than that display was the energy around them, deep still black for Shiro and a swaying and cresting blue for Lance, reaching for each other. They weren’t quite close enough for it to touch, lucky for Keith because when that happened they threw off energy in electric ripples that no one but him seemed to be able to feel, but it made his stomach turn just a little; even their auras were engaged in some weird pining display. 

He sipped his coffee and gagged, wincing at the bitter acrid flavor as it coated his tongue. Lance snorted then pushed a Starbucks cup across the table, closer to Keith. He all but leapt for it, nodding gratefully as he brought it up to take a sip. It was too sweet and pumpkin spice flavored, because Lance fucking would, but it wasn’t toxic so he was willing to deal with it. 

Shiro frowned. “I don’t know how you two drink that sugary junk. It makes my stomach hurt just smelling it.” 

Keith cut his eyes over to Lance who was wearing a deliberately blank expression. Shiro’s eyebrows went up, communicating something Keith, who considered himself something of an expert in all things Shiro, couldn’t decipher. But, judging by Lance’s eye roll and head shake he understood it just fine. 

Keith frowned against the lid of the cup before turning away from them. 

He didn’t exactly believe in soulmates and destiny. He knew that was ironic because he *saw* how peoples auras reacted in some situations and because he *saw* things when he was asleep but he prefered to believe people made their own fates. But if he did really believe in things like that he would have said Shiro and Lance were as made for each other as two people could be.

If he was really going to get into it he supposed he’d known that long before he’d known either of them. 

The thing was that, while Keith believed in making his own fate, he had some pesky prophetic dreams that insisted on coming true at least half the time and it was...an issue. He didn’t dream often, it was a side effect of being whatever it was he was, but sometimes he slept and he saw things. Other worlds, other realities, potential outcomes spinning out like a ball of yarn that had been dropped and allowed to roll away, people he knows or will know or knew once across the hazy lines of what is or isn’t…he saw it all, like he was some sort of antenna for the universe to...well, channel through. He didn't tell people about it, didn't want to imagine what would happen to someone who registered as being able to see the future, but he couldn't quite escape it. 

It wasn't fun. For the most part he saw horrible things, things put if his control that he had no hope of changing. When vampires had killed Katie's father and brother? He'd seen that, tried to interfere but in the end he'd been able to do nothing. When the government had come for Lance's sister because of illegal charm distribution he'd tried to talk to her ahead of time but she'd asked like she didn't know what he was talking about and eventually told him to get lost, going so far as to ward their house against him.

But sometimes the dreams weren't so bad.

He had dreamed about a lion, dark as midnight and full of stars, lying down on the sand next to the ocean, watching him with placid gray eyes, over and over in the month leading up to meeting Shiro. And maybe meeting was something that couldn’t be avoided, had been seen by the universe, but the dragon shifter becoming something like a brother to him was their doing. 

At least he liked to think it was.

He dreamt of a lion made of water, standing on the surface of the ocean with the night sky gleaming behind it, growling and swiping at him multiple times the week before he met Lance. He still remembered the first time the smart mouthed summoner had come up to him, proclaiming he was a better witch than Keith was and how bewildered he’d been about the claim because who was this angry guy getting in his face? 

He also remembered how two months later they’d been about to come to blows and Shiro had slid between them, trying to break up the impending fight. He remembered how when Shiro’s hand had touched Lance their auras had combined into a swirl of blue and black, not blending or losing their own color, but twining together. 

And then exploding with enough force that Keith had almost been knocked off his feet. Nothing like that had happened since but he didn’t think he’d ever be able to shake that feeling of magic rushing over him then tugging him down like a powerful wave. He’d been buzzing from it for days, riding off the residual magic he had absorbed. 

He hadn’t thought much of the dreams, of those lions and the places they stood before, but that night he’d dreamed again. Shiro’s lion by the ocean, Lance’s lion against a curtain of sky and stars, and it all clicked together. 

Except for the part where he’d have to share Shiro with other people. That part hadn’t clicked until later on. Keith didn’t care for it. 

“When is your friend due?” Keith asked as he, hopefully subtly, poured the coffee Shiro had made down the sink. Lance hummed then made a surprised noise. Keith glanced back to see the younger man standing up abruptly and hurrying out of the room. 

Shiro blinked slowly then smiled at Keith. “I’m guessing now.”

“You think?” 

Shiro’s eyes flickered, became glowing gold with snake like slits for pupils for a moment, then he shrugged and stood up as well. “Be nice to the guy, please. For me.” 

Keith made a face; 'for me' so clearly meant 'for Lance'. “Yes dad.” 

He wasn’t happy about the idea of someone else joining them. They had a good thing at the shop now. Allura and Coran still tutored him in magic, Shiro didn’t actually work there but hung around a lot, Lance was...well Lance was Lance, and Pidge handled all their tech and ran her business from the shop and it was just. Good. They all fit and he wasn’t eager to have that balance thrown off. 

He had, admittedly, felt the same way about Pidge when he’d been informed they were hiring a tech-witch to run the website, software, and protect the shop but then he’d had another dream. A lion made of vines and bark and dotted with flowers who crept along the shadow floor of a jungle, watching him with too intelligent eyes and had given him the impression of being laughed at had haunted him for the week leading up to meet Pidge-Katie. By the time he’d actually met her, in all her short, deadpan, slightly manic glory, he’d felt like he’d already known her. 

That was just how the dreams worked sometimes. He had them, someone showed up, and so far they ended up being important to him. Not always in good ways, in fact usually not in good ways, but always important in some way or another. He wasn’t willing to call it fate or destiny, because on occasion he had chosen to ignore what he’d seen so that meant he could still control it. 

As long as he didn’t mind the guilt that often came with turning away from someone in need because he was tired of trying and failing to help. 

There was only one dream that he hadn’t figured out yet. He’d been having it forever and he knew it should have brought someone to him, but hadn’t yet. The dream about Shiro’s lion had started a month before he’d met him and stood as the longest time he’d ever waited for ‘payoff’ but this one...this one had haunted him as far back he could remember. It had been there when he was young, secretly trying out his magic on his own because there was no one in his foster home to teach him and he knew what happened to non-humans who weren’t registered. 

He remembered it from being a teenager, after Shiro was at his side and he was training with Allura and Coran. Remembered it from after they'd started the shop, after Lance and Pidge had joined the fold. 

But nothing came from it.

He was in the desert, the sun bright and close, burning his skin, walking barefoot across the sand. At his side was a lion, tall and strong, fearsome but soft eyed, made of shifting sands and wind, brushing against his side as they walked. None of the other lions had been close enough to touch, had walked at his side, but this one was always there, silent but soothing and somehow soft to the touch when he should have been rough and gritty. There was a mountain in the distance, spewing fire and lava in great rivers, and every time he had the dream they were walking towards it. 

They never got any closer and it didn’t make any more sense to him, beyond that there was someone out there he would meet one day, so he’d just learned to live with it. 

Went through life and learned his runecraft, learned to infuse inks with crystal, herbs, and power, and now he worked with Lance to construct magic tattoos. It was a good business, booming really. Normal humans liked the ink, never knowing there was more to it, and the supernatural community knew the Castle of Lions was where the strongest protective and channeling tattoos could be found. He was happy, had friends so close to him they were basically family, but that dream always lingered. 

It had been a few weeks since he had it, the longest period without it popping back up so far, and if he was being honest he was starting to wonder if maybe...maybe he’d missed that person somehow. 

Watching Shiro and Lance be stupid and gross together didn’t help. He didn’t know if this person, the yellow sand lion, was the same thing for him that those two were to each other but he suspected...had a feeling...he wanted to know. Needed to know. 

“Keith!” Shiro shouted to him, jarring him from his thoughts. “Come up here.” 

He pushed away from the counter and, after making sure the coffee pot was going, grabbed Lance’s coffee and headed out to the front of the shop. He sipped the sugary pumpkin spice horror, wondering idly if maybe he had the dreams and auras all wrong because how could two people with such varying coffee tastes possibly be together, passed through the beaded curtain and

Stopped. 

Standing next to Lance, smiling as he shook Pidge’s hand, was a man. Tall and wide in jeans and a green hooded sweatshirt, deep russet brown skin, long black hair swept up into a ponytail held with a bit of yellow fabric, stubble crawling over his jaw, full lips, and dark brown eyes. His aura was golden, calm and shifting like desert sands being moved by the wind, circles and whirls and- 

It was beautiful. He’d always thought that Shiro and Allura, who had an aura that was silver and vibrant pink and throbbed as if it were it’s own separate, living entity, had the nicest energy fields he would ever see but he’d been wrong. 

All wrong. So very wrong because this man’s aura was...perfect. how could anything be so perfect?

The man blinked at him, confusion flashing on his face  then, smiling again, moved around Pidge to hold out his hand. “Hey, I’m Hunk. You must be Keith, yeah?” 

Keith stared down at his hand, large with long fingers, nails painted a peachy color, visible patches of raised skin on the palm, and a few shiny spots of scar tissue along the back. Black ink with threads of gold crawled up his arm, twisted around, runes and words put under the images showing briefly then covered up again.

He glanced up for a moment, heart squeezing as if trapped in a vice at the sight of his own aura, angry red and normally simmering and bubbling but strangely subdued now, reaching out towards the golden light around the man. Then back to the man himself and his dark eyes. The skin around them was crinkled and his expression was back to being confused.

“Keith?” Lance called, frowning at him. “You in there man?” 

He rocked back on his heels, tearing his eyes away from the man to look at Lance, and nodded slowly. “Y-yeah. Yeah. I’m fine. Sorry. Just tired. Nice to meet you Big Man.” 

He reached out, watching their auras out of the corner of his eye, and grasped the man’s hand. It was warm and big, easily enveloping his own, and he could feel the rough patches he’d noticed before pressing against his skin as his fingers curled around his hand. 

Their auras touched and Keith forgot how to breath, all the air in his lungs yanked right out of him and the grip on his heart became that much stronger.  Heat rushed over Keith; it was a wave of magic, strong and heavy and burning hot, but also something purely physical and strong that made his knees weak and stomach flip. It was electric and then it was an explosion, a deafening roar only he could hear and wave after wave of magic, gripping him and drowning him and

Everything went black. 

\---

Keith was dreaming but, as always, knowing it was a dream didn’t give him power and it didn’t change anything nor did it make things feel less real. 

He was back in the desert, lying on the sand, clutching his side. It hurt badly to breath and he could feel warm thick liquid pouring out over his hand. He groaned weakly, blinking against the gray haze creeping over his vision. 

The sand lion was in front of him, low to the ground and growling, blocking most of his vision. Between that and how dark everything was getting, it took a moment to realize that the shadows swaying and creeping around them weren’t shadows. They were something else, deep purple and sliding closer, pushing in. They lashed out, grabbed at the lion, tore away chunks of sand, tore it down until black and gold ink flowed from the gaps in it’s body. 

Keith screamed and fought and kicked and screamed. Screamed until his throat was raw and he could taste blood in his mouth then kept screaming, chest tight and heart hurting as the lion was pulled apart before his eyes. Screamed and- 


	2. What Keith Did

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for vaguely implied past suicidal thoughts.

He sat up, a scream lodged in his throat, thrashing against the hands on his shoulders. Magic tore out of him in a rush, clawed at his insides on the way out, and he heard things crashing and shattering for a moment and then it was drowned by a roaring that flooded his ears. He was blind for a moment, staring into nothingness, screaming his throat raw even though he couldn’t hear himself, twisting under his skin. Something touched him and he tried to push it away but then a familiar warmth was flowing into him, wrapping him up, pulling him close. 

“-be calm Keith.” Allura’s voice was soft but cut through the din in his brain, dragged him past it. “I am here with you. Hear my voice? Calm and follow it. Come back to me.” 

It was trying to drag himself up through a mud pit; his body was heavy and he felt like he was being dragged down by a clinging, sucking pressure. But Allura was there, voice a beacon in the dark, encouraging him to break free. 

His eyes snapped open and he dragged in a choked breath; he was cradled in someone's-Allura- arms, head resting on her narrow shoulder. His eyes were burning, vision wet and blurry, and his heart felt like it was going to beat right out of his chest. A hand stroked his hair; he blinked then tilted his head back to look up at Allura. Her brows were furrowed in concentration and her eyes were pools of pale blue light, shimmering like jewels. Her hair was fixed into a curtain of thin braids that were pulled back from her face, exposing her delicately pointed ears. 

“Ah, you're awake.” Her voice was strained, accent a little heavier than normal; the blue light in her eyes winked out. “I was worried.”

“Mostly about the shop.” Lance’s voice came from nearby. Keith twisted around to find him, wincing as he realized he was in the backroom and that it was...trashed. Everything had been blown to one side of the room to smash against the wall and each other. The table and chairs were broken, the other couch was on it’s side, all the appliances in the kitchenette were smashed and, as if there was any doubt it had been his doing, the scorch marks on the floor and walls did away with that idea quick. 

His hands shook as he pushed himself away from Allura and slide towards the opposite end of the couch, needing to put a little distance between them until he could collect the frayed strands of his magic and weave them back together. He like he'd torn a hole in the usually tight fabric that was his power and now the edges were ragged and he was leaking uncontrollably. 

He also didn't want her to feel how the shaking in his hands was spreading throughout his body or how cold he was becoming.  

Lance was standing just inside the doorway, looking none the worse for wear, expression stormy. He stepped closer, blue eyes sweeping over Keith like he was trying to see through him. The tattoo on his forearm, usually a wave at its peak just starting to curl in, was moving restlessly. The water was sharp choppy peaks, cresting and crashing then tumbling back out to rise up again, and the colors hard darkened from beautiful Caribbean inspired blues and greens to furious grays and dark blues touched with black. 

Keith was positive had hadn't seen Lance's tattoo, the one most tied to his magical potential and control, look like that since his sister was arrested. It was *not* an indicator of a happy Lance or one who was totally in control of himself and Keith would know. He'd done the tattoo himself, Lance's first, knew its flow and shape perfectly. Of course it was Lance's, could twist and change for him and become something totally different from what Keith had inked in an instant, but that never changed that he knew it. 

“You okay?” Lance asked finally, arms crossing over his chest. His aura was dark and clouded, strangely still. 

Keith nodded tiredly, eyes darting over to the pile of what had once been their break room anxiously. “Yeah. Tired.” 

Except not really. He should have been after a display like that. Forcing out the level of unfocused magic he must have, enough to destroy and scorch, should have drained his reserves, knocked him flat on his ass until he could recharge. But instead he had plenty to spare, enough to have it pouring out of him and still feel charged up. His aura was twisting around above him, dark and lopsided, threaded with gold stolen from Hunk, trying to curl in on itself to find where the damage was. It hurt, burned in his core, made him feel both too big and too small in his skin at once, uncomfortable and ill formed.  

But he was supposed to be tired, at the very least. They would expect that after such a huge flare-up that had him projecting energy is such a large amount so that's what he needed to say. It was lucky that he was the only aura reader here and so no one would be able to see the lie. 

Lance’s eyes narrowed. “Tired? That's it? You randomly drop like a sack of bricks, did all that while you're passed out,” a gesture towards the destroyed lounge was added here. “Did something that fried most of the wiring in the shop and...you're tired? How did you even project like that without burning yourself out?!”

Keith gaped, Lance’s harsh and demanding tone taking him by surprise. Lance didn't get upset often and when he did he tended to go quiet, not blow up. In fact he'd been getting on Keith for as long as they'd known each other about him having anger management issues. Lance yelling at him, seriously yelling and not just trying to get under his skin, was not a thing that happened. Keith looked over at Allura who smiled faintly and patted his knee. 

“What Lance means is that we were worried, Keith. That's why I called you back like I did.” 

He could feel her, the pale silvery strands of her, in his head, shining like beacons on the darkness. She and Coran had taught him a lot of what he knew, guided him with their own magic and thousands of years of knowledge. The connections they'd formed to do it were still there, like dormant electrical wires just waiting to be fired back to life. She'd pushed on them, flicked the switch, to reach him in his head and pull him back. 

She'd had to do it before, when he was younger and more easily overwhelmed by visions and his second sight. Without Allura he was pretty sure his head would have exploded. Or he would have tried blowing it up himself. He'd thought about it once or twice or a few dozen times, on the edge and willing to do whatever it took to stop the universe from reaching out and using his head as a satellite dish. 

Whatever it took. 

“About the shop.” Lance grumbled, eyes dropping and that was when it clicked for Keith. Lance wasn't mad he was scared. 

Allura rolled her eyes. “About you. The amount of magical energy you were putting out, and unfocused like that, was concerning. Shiro was, is, especially upset.” 

“Yeah,” Lance groaned, rubbing at his eyes. “Full on angry protective dragon, didn't want to let any of us near you. He almost ripped Hunk's head off.” 

Keith jumped, breathed, say the lion of sand ripped apart on the back of his eyelids when he blinked, and stood up. His legs wobbled and he almost crumpled under his own weight as the room started spinning. His head started pounding, a not so subtle reminder of what had just happened.

But Allura was there, holding him up and keeping him steady. “You need to rest Keith, not go tearing off to find Shiro.”

He looked up at her, confused for a moment. To find- Right. Of course that's what they would think. Hell, in most cases hearing Shiro had gone all dragon on everyone would put his friend at the top of his priority list, losing control like that always took a toll on him, but no. His mind had been on that dream, on Hunk, on sand and bubbling ink painting the earth. 

He ended up pushed back into the couch by Allura, mentally conceding it was probably better that he wasn't ready to go running off. What was he going to say or do about what he'd seen anyway? Confess to having a super rare ability to see the future, sort of kind of in a very abstract artsy way, and that he was pretty sure he'd seen Hunk die? And also maybe they were soulmates or destined or some shit?

No, no, that wouldn't work. 

It never worked. 

If he had seen Hunk die, if that was what the vision meant, then that was what was going to happen. Things didn't change, he just got the best seats in the house and advanced notice. 

Things didn't change. 

Except. Except he could see the flecks of gold in his aura, feel the burn of magic across his skin from touching Hunk, saw the way their auras had met and meshed like they were made to do it and-

“I have to change it.” Keith muttered. 

“Change what?” Lance asked, jerking Keith back to awareness. 

“Uh.” Had he been talking outloud? Was he that rattled? And shit, Lance was watching him, looking even more worried he had to think of something now. “The cat litter. I forgot this morning.” 

Lance’s lips pressed into a thin line. “You're thinking about cat litter. You...I'm going to get Shiro. He's sulking in the basement but maybe he'll shift back now that you're awake.” 

The summoner sent him one last long look then left the room. Keith shook his head and slumped over onto the arm of the couch. He had to do something. He didn’t know what, couldn’t imagine what would make a difference at all, and he knew it was selfish to act in this case when any other time he’d just let whatever was happening run it’s course but this. 

This was different and he was selfish. He wouldn’t let Shiro or Allura or any of his friends just die if he had a vision, he’d fight as hard as he could no matter what. He would never willingly give any of them up and Hunk was…

His aura glittered, like golden stars were trapped inside of it. 

“What did you see?” Allura asked. Her hand, slightly bigger than than his own with long graceful fingers, touched his. “Tell me.” 

He nodded and, with a nervous look towards the door, recounted his dream with as much detail as he could. Her brows furrowed and her lips pursed and, by the time he was done, she was chewing her lip anxiously. 

“That is a problem.” She said finally. “We can’t let that happen.” 

He was surprised but also wasn’t surprised by that. She was the one who told him to let no one else know about his visions, though he’d already suspected that was a good idea by that time, and she was the one who’d eventually coaxed him to stop trying to change what couldn’t be changed. Not because she didn’t want to help people, or didn’t want him to help people, but because she was tired of seeing him hurt himself. 

Not that she’d ever said that but he’d known. 

“What happened to ‘just let things go’?” 

She blinked at him slowly, looking for all the world like she’d never seen him before or he’d just grown a second head. “He’s one of the lions.” 

He waited to see if she’d say more but apparently that was all there was on that matter. And, he supposed, that was all there needed to be. She reached into the pocket of her jeans and pulled out a slightly crumpled card then pushed it into his hand. He glanced at it, eyes widening in surprise. 

“Seriously? You hired this guy?”

She shrugged then smiled crookedly. “I had a good feelings about him. Maybe it was fate.” 

He shot her a flat look. Her smile widened enough to show off a flash of teeth and her ears wiggled. 

“Keith!” Shiro came bounding through the door, more or less human. His eyes were golden and his horns hadn’t quite retracted all the way and his arm looked like it was covered in a very intricate scale tattoo, black interlocking pattern flexing and rippling just so. “Are you okay? I’m sorry I wasn’t up here when you woke up but I-”

“Turned into a big mother dragon and tried to stomp on Lance’s friend so Allura sent you to the basement?” 

Shiro looked sheepish for a moment, eyes sliding over to side but then he squared his shoulders and stood up straighter. “He did something to you, Keith. I could see it in the air and you...just screamed and dropped.”

Keith looked at Allura accusingly. “I screamed?”

“I didn’t feel like that was necessary information.” She shrugged. 

“And Hunk didn’t do anything to Keith.” Lance added, voice hard as he pushed past Shiro. His aura seemed to mimic him, pushing Shiro’s away. Keith watched, a sick feeling settling into his stomach. What the hell? “Even if he could do something to mullethead-”

“Hey!”

“He wouldn’t.” 

Shiro’s face went blank. “I felt it.” 

“I don’t care what you think you felt.” Lance shot back, glowering. “It’s not like you can work magic-”

“I am magic and I know what-”

Keith turned back to Allura who shrugged again. He didn’t need to be told that this was an argument they’d been having since he’d passed out and a serious argument at that. Shiro and Lance fought, everyone fought, but it was always little things that smoothed over fast. This was...not that. Instead of dancing together their auras had retracted after their little shoving match, no parts touching or reaching out. It was like a wall had some down between them. 

That had never happened before. 

“Shiro, take Keith home please. I don’t want him opening any doorways until he’s had some rest.” Allura said. She stood up, smoothing her oversized pink sweater down some. “Lance, if you could start rescheduling appointments and making calls while I help Pidge with repairs?” 

Lance muttered an agreement and, with one last dark glare in Shiro’s direction he was gone. Shiro didn’t turn to watch him go but his eyes did flicker, reptilian to human and back again and his scales rose up from his skin, inky black and gleaming, before smoothing out and going back to resembling tattoos. 

They went out the back, rather than trailing Lance to the front, and around to the small parking garage that Shiro kept his department issue car in. Keith settled in and immediately began fiddling with the heat; Shiro would need it full blast as soon as possible to fight how cold the car was. 

“I can have Shay cover my shift and hang out if you want.” Shiro said once they were on the road and if Keith hadn’t known him well enough to read the tension between his eyes and to notice the hint of lengthening teeth in his mouth he wouldn’t have known anything was wrong. 

“Right.” Keith said slowly, looking down at the card in his hand. “You are not going to like this.” 

\---

Shiro did not like it. He didn’t like it loudly and fiercely, with a fair amount of growling, the entire ride to the human side of town. Not only, he insisted, did he not want to leave Keith alone with Hunk period he sure as hell didn’t want to do it in the human distract. Their kind went missing in the human district, got snatched and broken down for parts or sold off to the highest bidder, got scooped up by less tolerant human cops who claimed they didn’t have proper ID and let them vanish into the system. 

Keith had just listened, let Shiro rant himself out, promised to Doorway home, and then all but run from the car when they pulled up in front of ‘Haggar’s Exorcism and Cleansings’. Which was...the tackiest name for an Exorcist shop Keith had ever seen.

Exorcists occupied a strange spot. They weren’t magical creatures or part creature. They were one-hundred percent human but they also weren’t like the occasionally fully human witch that occasionally cropped up either because they didn’t use magic...exactly. Or, rather, the magic didn’t come from within but, supposedly, from the blessing of the Gods. And could only be used for doing away with spirits and, supposedly, demons. 

Keith did not believe in demons. Or Gods. (Much to Lance’s horror.) He was actually kind of sketchy on the whole ghost thing and it was, honestly, only that Lance was an actual necromance that made him consider it.  

But the big thing about Exorcists was that, as a general rule, creatures didn’t care for them. Keith got that. There was something that chaffed about there being others, humans, who could use some form of magic but weren’t beholden to the same laws as the rest of them. 

And never did that seem more true than when Hunk, who lived above Haggar’s according to what was written on the business card, opened the door to let him into his apartment. It was, in comparison to Keith’s place, huge. And had walls. And distinctly separate rooms and more than one window and a real oven, not just a toaster oven that had seen better days. 

Hunk wasn’t alone. There was a woman, purple haired with red-rimmer amber eyes, sitting at the dining room table clutching a box of tissues. Keith hesitated at the sight of her peering in his direction and, suddenly, wished he’d called first. 

“Um. Hey.” Hunk said, head tilting to the side. “You doing okay?”

“Yeah.” Keith looked away from the woman, wincing slightly. “I can come back? I should have called or...I’m going to go.” 

Hunk’s hand darted out with surprising speed to latch onto his wrist. Keith almost jerked back on reflex, expecting pain or anything vision to follow. But there was only a mild shock, like static, and a warm tingling over his skin. Hunk made a surprised noise and let him go, eyes darting to the side. 

Keith might had taken an opportunity to look at Hunk’s arms. Not because they were nice or anything (but they were) but because the other man was wearing a pale yellow tanktop and it left all the ink on his skin exposed. And there was a far amount, one arm was covered from shoulder to wrist and the other from shoulder to elbow. One arm was thick, dark black lines and the other had a bit more color, grays and dark blues and whites to highlight. That one drew his attention first; an entire bio mechanical sleeve, gears, wires, pistons, all interlocking and seeming to burst out of Hunk’s skin in place. 

Some of the gears were moving slowly and when he reached up to rub at the back of his head the piston fired. It was good work, for a cosmetic magic tattoo. Keith could do better but for what it was it was nice. 

Hunk’s other arm however-

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have- I don’t know. Um. Just. Stay? She’s a client but we were basically done.” 

Keith bit his lip then, against his much better judgement, nodded. Hunk smiled brightly (Keith’s  stomach gave a strange little flutter) and pointed him towards his couch. He sat down, hands folding into his lap, and looked around a little. Hunk’s living room was mostly tidy and very homey. Squishy couch with oversized pillows, what looked like homemade quilts stacked under the coffee table, an odd assortment of seashells on top of the table, photos of grinning people who looked a lot like Hunk on the walls, shelving made of a pretty red wood and so full of books it was sagging at points. It was nice. Warm. 

Well aside from a workbench in the corner covered with...stuff. Wires, springs, coils, what looked an awful lot like bullets, a flask, lengths of chain and were those manacles? 

...Maybe this had been a bad idea. 

But he stayed where he was, paging through an issue of Exorcist Monthly and trying to decide if Twice Blessed Holy Salt was a bigger scam than Purified Holy Water when Hunk sat down next to him. And sighed. 

“Don’t look at that. I keep meaning to cancel my subscription, it’s all scams and stupid articles on new techniques by people who I don’t think have ever done so much as a house cleansing.” He plucked the magazine from Keith’s fingers with a scowl and tossed it back on the table. “I have real books, with legitimate information, if you want.” 

Keith swallowed a bark of laughter. “No thanks.”

“Right. Lance told me you’re a skeptic.” Hunk’s eyes brightened with amusement. “A witch who doesn’t believe in ghosts.” 

He rolled his eyes; Lance would tell people that. Not that Keith wouldn’t also tell people that if they asked; people assumed that because you could push a little magic into a potion or enchant some talismans that you must believe in everything but in his opinion what happened after people died, heaven and hell, angels and demons...that was a whole different level of stuff. 

“Maybe you should come with me sometime.” Hunk continued. “I bet you’d change your mind.” 

This time he did laugh; some of the hard knot of tension in his stomach eased. He knew he was here to try and make a case from his ‘future sight’, to try and save Hunk from whatever, but there was something about the other man that made him feel at ease in spite of the situation. 

Made him feel like Hunk would believe him. 

“Sure. I’ll get right on that.” 

“No, really.” Hunk’s eyes widened slightly and then he broke into a huge grin. “Tonight. I’m cleansing that woman’s house, her father died in there last week and it’s really probably nothing except a little residual psychic energy- don’t make that face-so it’s quick but you might be able to feel it.” 

Keith opened his mouth then shut it, not sure what to say. Hunk was inviting him, someone he’d met once and had promptly passed out (and caused Hunk to earn the rage of a dragon), out on a job with him? 

“If you’re feeling okay, I mean.” Hunk added after a pause. “That was dumb, driving out to the country to watch me burn incense is probably the last thing you want to do-”

“No,” Keith’s mouth said without his brains permission. “I want to. I’m kind of off for the day and free other than apologizing for probably freaking you out and almost getting you torn apart by Shiro.”

“Yeahhhhh.” Hunk said under his breath. “That was a tense moment.” 

Keith didn’t have anything to say to that because it probably had been tense, to say the least of things. Being face to face with an angry Shiro was being face to face with a fully grown (as in much heavier and bigger than an elephant) black dragon who could spit purple acid and exhale brilliant purple flames. There were very brave weres and goblins who’d pissed themselves when confronted with Shiro and Keith didn’t blame them. 

“So. What's with this? It’s impressive.” Keith asked just before the point where things would have gotten truly awkward, silence wise. His hands twitched towards Hunk's shoulder before he could stop himself. He did manage to keep himself from making contact, remembering that it was kind of creepy to go around pawing a guy you had met all of four hours ago. His fingers burned to trace the lines, feel the ink, understand what was, to his eyes, a beautiful knotted web.

It was a layered tattoo, power woven into the ink, into the design, under the design, and there was something else too that even he couldn't quite see. It was a shifting collection of heavy, thick black lines, spiraling and overlapping into thick bands, geometric shapes, connecting at points, looping onto sharp angles and softer curves arranged in a way that for a moment seemed to be a bigger picture but then moved again, hiding itself in smaller shapes, images, and pieces. 

It flowed from at least shoulder to elbow, maybe further under his shirt but Keith couldn't be sure. What he was sure of was that there was a lot of magic woven into it.from more than one person. He saw bits of Lance, rippling and bubbling, and the echo of others somehow blending together in near perfect harmony, saw the pulse of the ingredients in the ink, saw runes and words and-

He blinked and it was just a tattoo again. A magical one, yes, but nearly the twisting puzzle it had been a moment ago. There was a pounding behind his eyes and a strange heaviness in his mind, almost like dread. Something whispered that he'd been looking too hard, seen too much. 

Hunk tilted his head to the side, watching him with curious brown eyes. Then smiled again, amused and impressed and absolutely crushing Keith’s heart. “It's a lot of things, but mostly it’s pretty standard of my...order. Some anti-possession runes, a demon’s trap, the Lord’s prayer. Lance added some fey runes, for protection and strength. Other stuff.”

Keith smiled ruefully. “You say it likes it no big deal but I have...never seen anything like it.” 

“You seem like you see a lot.” Hunk’s voice went soft, thoughtful, and he was looking at Keith like he could *see* him, see into him, and Keith’s eyes widened. His throat tightened, a mixture of panic and...something else, and he stood up, laughing nervously. 

“Or I'm good at reading ink. It is my job.” He shoved his hands into the pockets of his pants, wished he had Shiro’s hoodie to hide in like he’d done back in high school and...well, as recently as a week ago, and made himself smile. 

“Right.” Hunk agreed, suddenly sheepish. “Right. Well. Anyway. If you want to help me with the cleansing we should get going. It's a long drive and you’ll probably want to stop home first, grab a coat. It gets cold up in Arusa.” 

The tension was still there, thick between them and clogging the air. Their areas were still tangled, dancing around each other despite the distance between them. 

“Yeah. Yeah let's go.” He rubbed at the back of his neck as he said it, eyes everywhere but on Hunk. And then he stopped, squinting. “I can make a door to my place. Unless you want one of my pissed off neighbors to key your car.” 

Hunk laughed then, seeing Keith's deadpan expression, stopped. “Wait, seriously? Why?” 

“We can't drive so a car is basically a big flashing ‘I'm human and don't go here’ sign. Some people are...resentful.” And by ‘can't’ he meant any creature that wasn't at least 3/4ths human wasn't allowed to get a license, with ones involved with law enforcement, like Shiro, being the exception to the rule. Just like they weren't allowed to live outside of the Magical District. Among other things. 

And by resentful Keith meant furious and potentially violent against humans. Especially ones who toed the magical line, like exorcists. 

“Oh.” Hunk’s eyebrow went up. “Door it is. ...how does that work?” 

Keith laughed then headed for the front door, fishing out a price of chalk as he went. He heard Hunk following him, felt his eyes on his back but paid it no mind as he pushed a tendril of magic into the chalk. He placed the tip on the opposite side of the doorknob, on the hinge side, and hastily drew another knob. He tucked the chalk away and put his hand on the door, visualizing his apartment. 

Then, for good measure: “If your way is blocked, all you must do is knock.” 

He rapped gently then pushed on the chalk doorknob. It swung open, revealing his tiny cluttered apartment, four of which could undoubtedly fit into Hunk's place.  Being human certainly had some very real perks.

Hunk whistled behind him. “That is...is that the real spell? The knocking?”

“No.” Keith smirked. “I saw it on Charmed.” 

This, he decided as he stepped over herb and plant pots, skirted a dangerous tilting pile of books, and shooed Red away from some potions he had resting on the windowsill to collect sunlight and cure, was actually fine. He’d watch Hunk do his thing, keep an open mind, and then when he went ‘Surprise, in my head you’re a lion and I saw you get torn to shreds in a dream’ Hunk would also keep an open mind. 

Great plan. 

\---

Keith didn’t think he’d ever had something go so wrong so fast. 

The ride up was fine, filled with talk about how Hunk had met Lance: Hunk’s aunt was a Summoner, elemental not the dead, and lived next to Lance’s mom. Anytime Hunk can to Altea to visit he and Lance would be stuck together to play and twenty some odd years later it had just stuck. What Hunk was doing in Altea: he’d worked at a church (A. Fucking. Church. After four years of seminary school. Keith was scandalized.) in Hawaii but it had been decided (and here his face had scrunched up a little and his eyes clouded over) he’d be more useful freelancing/working with Haggar than at a little parish on an island. 

Keith got the feeling there was a lot more there but he wasn’t the sort of person to ask after that sort of thing. He’d talked about himself a little, not that there was much to talk about. Channeler, specialized in alchemy and specifically ink making but he was in general good with putting things together and infusing them with magic. He’d designed most of his own tattoos and yes, he did really like flowers. 

He learned that Lance talked about him, about all of them, a lot so Hunk already knew a lot of what there was to know. Which he decided was fine. It was comfortable trip, just talking and fiddling with the radio and feeling strangely like he already knew Hunk. Like they’d done this before.

If it had just been the car ride it would have been a really good end to what had started as kind of a shit day.

Arusa was a suburban human area, up in the hills, where all the houses were two story cardboard cutouts with identical lawns. Keith hated it right away and was feeling downright itchy by the time he was following Hunk into the house. They got two steps in and then Hunk stopped, body going rigid and skin gaining an ashen tint. 

“We need to leave.” Hunk said softly, eyes darting around. “Back up slowly.”

“What? Why are we-” 

Was all Keith got out before something, a cold pressure, pushed him from behind. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes Keith. Just wait to tell Hunk you saw him sort of die in a dream you had. NBD.


End file.
